72 EUPHORBIACEZ. 
Calyx of male flowers open in bud; 
leaves alternate ; stamens 2; styles 
free or connate at the base; fruit a 
capsule.—Trees with monecious 
flowers in terminal spikes . : . 21. Sarium. 
1. EUPHORBIA, Linn.; Fl. Brit. Ind. V, 244. 
Herbs, shrubs or small trees of various habit and provided with 
copious milky juice. Stems slender and leafy or thick and fleshy, 
sometimes leafless or nearly so. Leaves alternate or opposite, 
usually entire. Flowers moncecious, combined in an inflorescence 
of many male florets surrounding a solitary female, all enclosed 
within a small 4-5-lobed turbinate or campanulate perianth-like 
involucre, involucre-lobes with thick glands at the sinuses, glands 
with often a petaloid spreading white or coloured limb. Matz. 
flowers composed of a simple pedicelled stamen without floral en- 
velopes, anthers 2-celled. FEmatz-flowers consisting of a 3-celled 
pedicelled ovary in the centre of the involucre, also without floral 
envelopes ; styles 3, free or connate, stigmas simple or 2-fid. Fruit 
a capsule of three 2-valved cocci separating elastically from a 
persistent axis and dehiscing ventrally or both ventrally and 
dorsally. Seeds albuminous; cotyledons broad, flat.—Species 
about 600, chiefly in subtropical and warm temp. regions. 
| Stems not developed above ground ; leaves all 
radical.—A dwarf perennial glabrous herb . 7. £. acaulis. 
Stems well developed above ground ; leaves not 
all radical :-— 
Shrubs or small trees with thick fleshy and 
often prickly branches :— 
Branches ascending, armed with pairs of 
short persistent spines :— 
Style-arms 2-cleft; branches promi- 
nently 3-6-angled; leaves few, less 
than lin.long,soonfalling ; . . 2. E. antiquorum. 
Style-arms undivided :— 
Branches prominently 5-7-angled and 
with flat intervening spaces ; leaves 
4-6 in. long ’ : 4 . 3d. E. Royleana. 
